Scratch one Royal Navy carrier — sort of
October 26th, 2009 | Aviation Carriers Royal Navy | Posted by Phil Ewing
One of the Royal Navy's planned carriers, scene in this illustration, could lose its capability to carry F-35Bs, the Ministry of Defence said Sunday // Royal Navy
Is it the first step toward the Royal Navy losing its new carriers? Or is it a compromise that will ensure they’ll both be built? Those seem to be the two options after the announcement Sunday that the Royal Navy is willing to delete the capability to handle F-35B Lightning IIs from one of its two Queen Elizabeth-class carriers, now just beginning construction. That would mean the Ministry of Defence could buy fewer fighters, saving billions of pounds, but that for all its recent sacrifices, it would only field half the naval air power it originally wanted.
According to The Guardian, this could mean the Royal Navy might have to make even further concessions about its two carriers, including eliminating one or both altogether. And The Times reminds us the carrier change represents “another blow to the [Royal] Navy’s prestige,” after the British government announced not too long ago it was considering deleting one of the fleet’s four Vanguard-class ballistic-missile subs.
Here’s even more context: News broke on Friday that the Joint Strike Fighter could be billions of dollars over-budget and possibly in need of restructuring. So what would fewer jets going to the U.K. do to the rest of the program? Good question.
As it is, the Royal Navy is looking at a situation in which it’s spending a lot to get a ship it effectively didn’t need to build, writes Mike Burleson:
“We can only wonder if an upgraded Ocean class with a strengthened deck would have been less costly and less a burden to build during wartime.”
Undersea update
October 23rd, 2009 | nuclear weapons Submarines | Posted by Andrew Scutro
Just in time for the Naval Submarine League’s annual symposium next week here near Washington, D.C., the good news arrives that the ballistic missile submarine West Virginia successfully launched two unarmed D-5 Trident II ballistic missiles on Oct 23., likely off the Navy’s missile test facility in Port Canaveral, Fla.
Maybe more likely to come up in discussion at Sub League will be the recent honor bestowed on the crew of the fast attack submarine Hartford. They were commended on Oct. 20 for 1,000 consecutive days without any of the 140 crew involved in a drunk driving incident. What might ignite a few wisecracks during a coffee break is that Hartford has been under repair at Electric Boat in Groton because on March 20 in the Strait of Hormuz it collided with the amphib New Orleans.
Navy’s top techie approves social media tools
October 23rd, 2009 | Blogs Navy Science and technology | Posted by Andrew Tilghman
Anybody see the Navy’s Chief Information Officer’s blog this week? Rob Carey, the Navy’s top techie, approves of sites like Facebook.
3. Social Media as a Tool to Build Trust. Social media is an inherent part of the toolbox for members of the millennial workforce, while baby boomers are just adopting it. Social media tools should become the standard by which we can share and collaborate on information inside and outside the network boundaries.
Nevertheless, there is a downside.
EA-35? Not so fast.
October 23rd, 2009 | Aviation Carriers Navy Science and technology | Posted by Andrew Tilghman
A few weeks back, we wrote a story about the future of electronic attack aircraft in the Navy and Marine Corps.
That story made a reference to preliminary talk of the Marine Corps eventually using the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter for electronic warfare.
But I was over at the annual Electronic Warfare conference this past week and bounced that idea off an EW expert from the Joint Electronic Warfare Center and he called the idea “ridiculous.”
The jamming signals emitted by the EW pods are “loud” and make the aircraft easily identifiable on any radar, he said. Why would we spend billions of dollars developing a stealthy fighter jet just to attach EW pods that eliminate all the advantages of the stealth features?
Good thing the Corps has another a few years until it has to decide what will replace their Prowlers in 2017.
What would the Navy do without GPS?
October 23rd, 2009 | Aviation Life at Sea Maritime operations Science and technology Ships Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
QMSN Antonia Mack plotted a course the old fashioned way aboard the destroyer O'Kane // MC2 Mark Logico/ Navy
Pity the poor visitor who brings a car here to the National Capital Region. Washington and its suburbs can be an impenetrable maze unless you know the territory or you have help from the Global Positioning System. That said, just imagine what it’d be like to try to sail an amphibious assault ship from San Diego to Guam without it. So if GPS stopped working, a lot of people all over the world would (literally) be lost.
And it could, in fact, stop working: According to a Government Accountability Office report quoted by Avionics Magazine, GPS users could start seeing “brownouts” as soon as next year because the GPS satellite constellation is over-burdened and wearing out. Although it would still be available to Navy, other military and civilian users, no one is quite sure whether it will remain as accessible as it is today:
The impacts to both military and civil users of a smaller constellation are difficult to precisely predict,” the agency [GAO] said. “For example, a nominal 24-satellite constellation with 21 of its satellites broadcasting a healthy standard positioning service signal would continue to satisfy the availability standard for good user-to-constellation geometry articulated in the standard positioning service performance standard. However, because the GPS constellation has been operating above the committed performance standard for so long, military and civil users have come to expect a higher level of service, even though this service is not committed to them. Consequently, some users may sense an operational impact even if the constellation were to perform at or near its committed standards.
So Navy navigation teams should probably keep their charts and rulers, and the rest of us should probably hang on to our paper maps.
H/T: Kennebec Captain
Hoo-ya, smoke shrine
October 22nd, 2009 | leadership Life at Sea Photos | Posted by Phil Ewing
MC2 Matthew White/ Navy
Back in Scoop Deck’s camping days, the standard practice was to say “I hate white rabbits” when smoke from the campfire was blowing on you, to magically send it in the other direction. (This does not actually work.) At this shrine outside the Sensoji Temple in Tokyo, however, the objective is to get the smoke on you, to absorb its curative powers. If it works, Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy (SS/SW) Rick West, and the other top enlisted leaders with whom he recently toured Tokyo, should be healthy for a long time… or at least give off a distinctive aroma.
The boat you don’t want to be in
October 21st, 2009 | Carriers Life at Sea Maritime operations | Posted by Phil Ewing
MC1 Nathan Guimont/ Navy
Here’s the type of watercraft in which one might normally while away a pleasant afternoon, knockin’ back a few cold ones and fishin’ for walleye, but it will no longer be of much use for that. Sailors aboard the carrier George Washington used this boat for target practice Tuesday.
Heavy lift helo links
October 21st, 2009 | Historical Maritime operations Royal Navy Ships The Middle East | Posted by Phil Ewing
A Marine CH-53E Super Stallion from HMH 464, the "Condors," flew over the Gulf of Aden, much as today's links fly new information to you // Tech. Sgt. Jeremy T. Lock/ Air Force
Big, loud, heavy, smelly, hydraulic fluid drippin’, cargo carryin’, mine sled dredgin’ links, getting ready to touch down on the flight deck and unload these updates:
- The crew of the cruiser Anzio — which you met a few weeks ago here on the Deck — made life unpleasant for some drug smugglers in the Gulf of Aden this week.
- As if South Carolina’s Patriots Point museum didn’t already have enough problems, Naval Sea Systems Command has passed the word: Either fix up the carrier Yorktown, which is in bad shape, or get ready to sink it.
- Today is the 212th anniversary of the launch of the frigate Constitution, or Old Ironsides, as we call it, which has made Maggie very excited, because she gets to take it out for a spin.
- Speaking of launches, the Royal Navy’s fifth Type 45 destroyer, or the Daring-class, as we call it, was set to launch today in the River Clyde in Scotland.
- Speaking of launches, the U.S. Navy and the Royal Navy, check out this piece about the birth of the Continental Navy from Naval History and Heritage Command.
New blog After Action brings you the world of mil-sports
October 20th, 2009 | Blogs Life at Sea Sports The deckplates | Posted by Phil Ewing
Sports are often compared to war — linemen “battle” for the gridiron; bad pitchers get “shelled;” and in the backfield, the secondary provides “optimized, time-critical network-centric support for the joint defense.” So it’s no surprise that the military is chock-full of great athletes and, generally, that the services are permeated by a culture of sports and competition.
In that spirit, Military Times brings you After Action, a new joint blog from all four colors of the rainbow (green, light blue, regular blue and red) about sports in and around the armed services. Check it out here, let us know what you think and send us tips about anything sports-related going on with your service, your local command, or just who won the paper football game in the DFAC last night. And send pictures!
CNN discovers skepticism of “Global Force for Good”
October 20th, 2009 | leadership Morale Personnel Video Washington | Posted by Phil Ewing
Sailors from the dock landing ship Tortuga conducted global goodness operations in the Philippines last week. The Navy's new slogan, "Global Force For Good," has encountered some early critics // MC1 Geronimo Aquino/ Navy
How influential are Navy Times readers like you? When CNN wanted to hear what no-kidding Navy people thought about the sea service’s new recruiting slogan, “America’s Navy, a Global Force For Good,” the network quoted posts on Navy Times’ forums that showed, for the most part, today’s sailors aren’t quite captivated by it.
CNN’s Lou Dobbs program aired the piece Monday night, and you can view it here.
There’s just something about this story… even after our article appeared summarizing responses from many of the sailors we asked about “Global Force For Good,” the emails have kept pouring into the Inbox of Excellence. Just yesterday we heard from Intelligence Specialist 1st Class (SW/AW) Grant Miles, who was watching TV with his wife this weekend when he saw the ad for the first time:
“…[O]nce it was done I asked her what she thought. She said, ‘It’s a good commercial, but what is with that slogan? It makes it sound like you guys are the world’s police force or a bunch of conquerors.’ So I think the latest commercials have been great but with the changing of the slogan I don’t think people are going to join because they can do good things.”
It’s been a few weeks since the debut of “Global Force For Good.” Is it growing on you?